Japan and Britain After 1859: Creating Cultural Bridges

2 The Great Exhibition asa cultural bridgeThe challenge of the Great ExhibitionDuring the Meiji Years, that is from 1868 to 1912, nothing was more difficultfor the new Japanese leadership than the exhibition, an internationaldisplay taking place in various Western cities designed to glorify thewonders of the new industrial age. Exhibitions in the nineteenth centurywere a remarkable mixture of lofty aims and crude commercialism. Theyrevealed blatant nationalism, a false internationalism and an ardent imperialism.1 By demonstrating national pride the exhibition could also beenthusiastic about informing and educating the people, demonstrating tothem the glories of the new science and technology of the age. Underlyingall this self-promotion were the hard realities of commercial success.The Japanese, already mortified by their non-conformity, decided to takeon the International Exhibition, ‘one of the measures Japan had positivelyundertake to counter the current of capitalism in the world market intowhich Japan had been drawn, willingly or unwillingly, after having openedthe country’. 2 Japan’s commitment was intended ‘to show off the originalityof Japanese culture in the face of Western culture. We can call it culturalnationalism against the economic military and cultural power of theWestern countries which were then menacing Japan.’ 3The British had started the ball rolling when, in 1851, inspired by QueenVictoria’s consort, Prince Albert, 4 they had organised the ‘Great Exhibitionof the Works and Industry of all the Nations’. The Japanese, in the form ofthe Iwakura Mission, 5 a large group of new young Japanese leaders, cameface to face with the exhibition in Vienna in the summer of 1873. At thatstage the Japanese were already reeling from the shock of seeing and experiencingthe industrial might of Western Europe. They had landed atLiverpool on 17 August 1872; by 29 April 1873 they were in Vienna. In theinterval they had by railway and steamship visited Britain, France,Germany, Sweden, Denmark and Russia; wherever they went they had beenshown industrial marvels in which all these industrialised nations gloried.For the purpose of this brief survey attention will be given to the financialcommitment that the new Japanese government made to the